2020 Sapora Symposium

CHERYL HANLEY-MAXWELL: Good evening, everyone. And welcome to the 2020 Sapora Symposium. I know that this venue is very different, but I think it's giving us opportunities that we might not otherwise have, bringing in people that we could not otherwise bring in.

I'm delighted by the theme for this year's symposium, sport and social justice. And I'm gratified to say that the Department of Recreation Sport and Tourism and the College of Applied Health Sciences have been longtime leaders in leveling the playing field for countless individuals, families, and communities through our educational, research, and community outreach programs. Sport has long been used to overcome divisions, unite people, and to extend an invitation to participate to previously marginalized groups, and has often done this before the rest of society is even caught on to the notion.

This evening and over the next six weeks, you will be introduced to remarkable people and organizations who have used their involvement in sport as a platform for addressing inequality and injustice. I urge you to listen carefully, take to heart their messages, and seize the opportunity to grow not only professionally but personally. Have a wonderful experience.

CARLA SANTOS: Welcome and good evening, everyone. Welcome to the 18th annual Sapora Symposium. The symposium was founded by the RST alumni advisory board and is a natural extension of the work that Dr. Allan Sapora did-- who really believed in mentoring younger generations and in providing them with critical connections to professionals in the field.

Dr. Allan Sapora was a pioneer in recreation, education, and research, and was instrumental in establishing the Department of Recreation and Park Administration at the University of Illinois in 1957. He later served as our department head. He earned his bachelor's degree at the University of Illinois, graduating with bronze tablet distinction in 1938. A Big Ten and an NCAA wrestling champion, he received the Big Ten Conference medal as the university's most outstanding athlete scholar. In 1991, he was elected to membership in the Illinois wrestling coaches, an official association Hall of Fame. Dr. Sapora earned a master's degree from the University of Illinois and a PhD from the University of Michigan.

During his 37 years at Illinois, he conducted [INAUDIBLE] and recreation surveys, including a 1971 Illinois state-wide survey to determine public perceptions of state parks. He played a key role in the expansion of local, state, and National Park systems, and is widely credited with developing Leisure Studies abroad. The annual Sapora Symposium offers undergrad students and grad students a unique opportunity to learn about significant issues in recreation, sport, and tourism while connecting with professionals throughout the leisure industry.

Faculty and staff at the Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism at the University of Illinois work to advance knowledge about the choices that people make for their discretionary time throughout the lifespan, including outcomes of those choices at personal, family, community, and institutional levels. Our students learn to design and implement a variety of RST experiences to different populations. This can include anything from managing a national, state, and local park, to professional sports, to developing and delivering study abroad experiences or working for tourism and hospitality providers. This year, our presentations are focused on the role of RST in fostering equity, inclusion, and social justice, a critical topic at this time when there is so much divisiveness and upheaval tearing us apart. Is all too easy, unfortunately, to forget that we are all members of the same family and to focus on what unites us rather than what separates us.

RST and sport has always been a way to bring people together as participants and as fans to celebrate the vitality of amateur and professional athletes and their love for their sports, whether it is a pickup basketball game at the local park district or a World Series Championship. In the series of virtual presentations that make up this year's symposium, you will meet and hear from folks who have made a complete difference in the ways we use and think about sports, individuals who have used sports unifying power to promote gender and racial equity, to raise awareness of disability and gender identity, and to build cultural pride.

I want to do a very warm thank you to our wonderful panelists today, Dr. Mary Hansen, Dr. Phillips, Dr. Hightower Dr.-- I believe-- Rob Heavens-- and if not, then we just gave him one-- and Mark Holmes. I also want to thank the Office of the Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion for their support of this year's Sapora symposium.

I would also like to thank the RST alumni and all the other industry professionals who have agreed to share their experiences and advice with our students, our alumni, our faculty, and our friends. Your generosity will resonate for years to come as current students bring your wisdom to bear on their own careers and their own lives. As they return in the future to assume roles that you have today, the cycle of mentoring and connection that was so important to Dr. Sapporo will survive and thrive within the Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism. And now, it is my pleasure to welcome the Marching Illini under the direction of Barry Houser.

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MIKE RAYCRAFT: OK. Good evening, sports fans. My name is Mike Raycraft. I'm a faculty member of the Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism. It is an honor to welcome each of you to the 18th annual Sapora Symposium, as they celebrate industries and individuals who are leaders in promoting social justice as a vehicle to impact economic development, inclusion, and cultural cohesion. The symposium this year is dedicated to the life of Louis R. Henson, the winningest basketball coach in University of Illinois history and a pioneer in integration of intercollegiate athletics. The celebration of Coach Henson, led by his family and colleagues, promises to bring new insight to the man inside the famous orange jacket, and inspire us all to be trailblazers in our own community.

Our [INAUDIBLE] is Jim Phillips, an Illinois alumnus, former Illini basketball staffer, and the vice president of athletics and recreation at Northwestern University. Dr. Phillip is the vice chairman of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament selection committee for the 2020-2021 season and has remained a close friend to the Henson family since his undergraduate days in Champaign. Welcome home, Jim. And thanks for being here tonight.

JAMES PHILLIPS: Thanks, Professor Raycraft. Before I get started, I just want to say a sincere and heartfelt thanks to Dean Maxwell, Carla, you, Professor Raycraft, for putting this together. This is truly a tribute to somebody that we all love dearly and somebody that's meant an awful lot to each of us. And as a former student at Illinois, thank you for your dedication and commitment to the undergraduates and the graduates there in Illinois that will level a lifetime with experiences that they've had in Champaign-Urbana that you've been a part of. So thank you.

Tonight's about a celebration of Coach, and that's what a lot of us called him. A career defined by excellence, and it's my pleasure to just start this symposium by giving our audience a chance to understand the greatness that was Coach Henson. Coach started at Las Cruces high school, New Mexico, led them to three straight championships in 1959 to 61. He was a head coach for 42 years in Illinois, New Mexico State, and Hardin-Simmons.

He desegregated Hardin-Simmons men's basketball in 1962, and I look forward to more conversation on that as we go along this evening; served as athletic director and coach for six years at New Mexico State, catalyst for the state funding of the Pan American Center; coached two different Final Four teams, Illinois in 1989, which I was fortunate to be a part of, and New Mexico State in 1970; 21 20 game seasons, 2 at Hardin-Simmons, 8 at New Mexico State, 11 at the U of I; 18 NCAA appearances, including two elite eights and four sweet 16's; seven consecutive top five seeds in the NCAA tournament from 1984 to 1990, only matched by Georgetown and North Carolina; four NIT appearances; one of the top 20 all time winningest coaches in college basketball history, nearly 800 wins.

He won Big Ten and big West championships. The Lou Henson National Player of the Year award was established by College Basketball Insider in 2010. One the top five all time winningest coaches in Big Ten history, a conference that's been around for over 100 years; one of only two coaches to have two basketball courts named in his honor, Illinois New Mexico State-- only the great John Wooden shares that honor with courts named in Coach Wooden's honor at UCLA and Indiana State; coached numerous Illinois and New Mexico State student athletes who went on to play in the NBA, Eddie Johnson, Ken Norman, Kendall Gill-- my roommate in college-- Derek Harper, Luke Anderson, Sam Lacey, Charlie Chris, John Williamson, and Jimmie Collins.

He was warm. He was kind. He was a gentleman. He was a leader. And all of those accolades take backseat to his pride and joy, which was his family. His beautiful and stunning wife Mary, who we'll get a chance to talk with later, his daughters Leann, Laurie, and Lisa, and his son Lou Junior. So Mark Coomes, let me toss it over to you. And take us through the rest of the program.

MARK COOMES: Thank you very much, Jim. Let me begin by thanking Dr. Raycraft and the college for allowing us to paint a portrait of Lou Henson, a great coach but even a greater human being. I hope after the evening has concluded, the viewers in the audience will have a clearer understanding of Lou Henson the coach and Lou Henson the man.

|t is great to be with this outstanding all-star panel this evening and share recollections about how Coach affected and influenced our lives. Coach Rob Evans played for him and worked for him. Dr. Jim Phillips worked for him. I worked for him on three different occasions. And Dr. [INAUDIBLE] Hightower was a top NCAA referee for decades. He was considered an independent contractor who worked with coach on the floor. And of course, Mary was with Coach for 65 and a half years, and is the star of the show tonight. We all come from different backgrounds, but the common denominator for all of us was Lou was always in our corner. That's why we're here this evening. I also want the audience to understand the members on this panel are very accomplished in their respective fields. They have all worked hard to accomplish their career goals.

The format this evening is simple. I will make a few short comments about each panelist from my perspective. I know each of them well. Then panelists will present their thoughts about Coach Hanson and themselves. Then Mary will join the presenter, and we'll converse about this past together. Each presentation will be approximately 10 to 11 minutes in length. And after the Illinois presentation is completed, I will circle back to each presenter for their final thoughts. This will be a lot of fun.

As you can see I'm wearing a New Mexico State cap. I'm wearing a Hardin-Simmons shirt. And I'm wearing coach's coat that he wore in practice for 21 years. Each of these three schools, I might add, were all down when he took over the helm at each one of them-- especially New Mexico State and Illinois, who were at all time historical lows.

As a moderator, I want to be completely transparent with you. I was very fortunate. In December of 1954, coach Henson married my deceased mother's sister. I referred to her as Aunt Mary from the time I could talk, and I will continue that tonight. And Mary and Lou were made to be a basketball couple. Coach was sometimes not a warm and fuzzy coach to play for or to work for. He was of old school [INAUDIBLE] the cycle. You believed in fundamental basketball, and you played a certain way or found the bench to sit on for a while. And Mary was a perfect complement to Lou in many ways. I have heard player after player all marvel over the decades how she treated and paid attention to them, especially when they were down. And Mary, you loved Lou dearly, supported him unequivocally, and defended him against all detractors with all your might. And believe me, Aunt Mary has a lot of might.

Coach started his coaching career 58 years ago in 1962 at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene, Texas. I'm going to read parts of a letter from the Hardin-Simmons administration, which has been written about the legendary career of Lou Henson and success on the court, largely at New Mexico State and Illinois.

It's our honor to give the story of Henson's start to his collegiate career and perhaps even more importantly, the social and cultural impact he had on Hardin-Simmons. Henson was hired at a pivotal time in athletic directory. When the school disbanded after the '61-'62 season, it sent the University in flux. Looking for a basketball coach, the University settled on 30-year-old Lou Henson to take over the program. He accepted the job on the condition he would be able to desegregate the program. Henson recruited Nate Madkins and Arthur Haynes from Okolona Junior College in Mississippi to break the color barrier for the Harden Simmons basketball program. That was just the start of a four year stint at Harmin-Simmons that had a monumental impact on the University.

In January '64, Henson assumed a dual role as athletic director and coach after Hardin-Simmons disbanded its football program. Henson's next major move to Hardin-Simmons landscape was adding women's basketball and volleyball to give women more opportunities to compete at the collegiate level. Not only had Henson broken the color barrier with the basketball program, he added gender diversity on campus at a time when that was not the norm. In his third season the Cowboys had a 17 and eight record and then went 20 and six for his fourth season. After the '65-'66 season with a record of 67 and 36, Lou finished his career at Hardin-Simmons and resigned to return home to his alma mater as head coach of New Mexico State.

He had nearly 800 wins in his career but obviously had a great mind for the game, but his impact on the culture at Hardin-Simmons needs to be listed as one of his greatest achievements. It is with great honor, respect for this legendary coach and man that Hardin Simmons unconditionally endorses Lou Henson's nomination to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, signed Eric Bruntmyer, president; Dr. Jon Neese, director of athletics; and Chad Grubbs, director of communication.

Winning immediately-- which all of us coaches have to do as soon as we can, desegregating the basketball program and adding opportunities for females in athletics when he became a dean were monumental achievement Lou accomplished Hardin-Simmons. He did this years before federal legislation passed regarding Title IX on June 23, 1972, which made athletic activities available equally for females. In addition, the individuals tonight, our stories are not unique to ourselves. When you think of managers and grad assistants that have been around Coach, you think of people who have great successes in their lives.

Jim Phillips is here tonight-- also, Joe Lopez, Keith Colson, Jon Burgess, the late Eddie Murphy, the late Toni Yates, Woethke, Bob Hall, Jimmy Collins, Dick Nagy, Mark [INAUDIBLE], Russ Bradford, Chris Crutchfield, Thomas Trotter, and Toni Stubblefield. All assistant coaches, if they could be here, would tell their story about how Coach helped to shape their careers and their lives. We all knew he was unwavering in his loyalty with a capital L and would do anything to help us in our profession.

An additional act that sets Coach apart from others is when he was called upon to help New Mexico State when the program was in turmoil. The coach had gotten fired, they were cash-strapped, and the NCAA was investigating. Shortly after he gracefully retired from Illinois, a year and a half later, he took over the program on October 17th, 1997 two days before practice on a pro bono basis or free. The university realized very quickly that they couldn't ask the guy. It was against the law, against the rules to ask him to coach for free. So he agreed on a $1 a month salary. Isn't that unique with today's salaries? He did such a great job. He continued on until viral encephalitis struck him down, and he had to retire for good in January of 2005.

These are a few examples why tonight we are painting a portrait of Coach Hanson as a quiet icon. I'm going to read a paragraph from President Mike Martin, who was with Lou at New Mexico State the second time. This was part of his letter to the Naismith Hall of Fame on behalf of Lou.

Among the successful coaches I've come to know, a fairly large segment exhibit a certain arrogance. Many earned the right to be arrogant, some have not. One of the many qualities I most admired in Coach Henson was he earned the right but did not have an arrogant bone in his body. He was engaging, humble, gracious, and kind. He had a wonderful self-deprecating sense of humor. He could be intense on the sideline during a game, never using profanity but always using intensity to create a teachable moment unquote.

Lou believed in giving people opportunities, helping institutions, and just doing the right thing. His personal traits of humanity towards people were ingrained in his heart and in his soul. He had a profound positive effect on thousands and thousands of people. Aunt Mary, would you please tell us how you and Lou-- your first college opportunity in 1962 at Harden-Simmons.

MARY HENSON: It's hard to follow that one.

MARK COOMES: You can do that. You can do that very easily, Aunt Mary.

MARY HENSON: Hello again, everybody. Thanks so much for joining us on this very special night. Dr. Raycraft, all of your efforts and those of your school to facilitate this symposium are greatly appreciated. I am truly honored to be participating. My hope is that the takeaway will be that just one person doing the right thing can make many positive changes in people's lives.

Picture this. The year is 1962. A 30-year-old high school basketball coach and math teacher and his 25-year-old wife, parents of three kids under five with probably 20 bucks between them, in their little Volkswagen headed east on a 500 mile trip from Las Cruces, New Mexico to Abilene, Texas for the interview of a lifetime. That's the way we viewed it at the time. Miraculously, Lou had been asked to interview for the position of head basketball coach at Hardin-Simmons, a small southern Baptist University. Luckily, a friend and agreed to keep the kids. So Lou and I were able to discuss all kinds of possibilities and issues in case he got the job.

True to form, the teacher had done his homework. Lou was keenly aware that Hardin-Simmons University, a D1 school at the time, was segregated. Lou had played college basketball in New Mexico A&M University, now New Mexico State. And he had played for Coach Presley Askew, who had integrated that school in 1955. Lou had also coached high school ball for six years at Las Cruces High, which had been integrated for nine years. Coaching a segregated team for any school was not an option for Lou. And that's what Lou expressed to the Hardin-Simmons board during the interview. He would be happy to accept the position of head basketball coach if they agreed to integrate the school.

Lou told me later that a lot of eyebrows shot up around the room when he made his request. Nevertheless, the board members agreed to meet again and give him their decision in the morning. To their everlasting credit, the board offered Lou the job the next day, effectively ending segregation at Hardin-Simmons University in 1962 well before many, many other southern universities became integrated.

You can probably imagine how this young couple were with the outcome of our trip. We plotted and planned for the whole eight hours on our return to Las Cruces. It was surreal to us that not only had Lou jumped from high school to a college job, which we thought was impossible, but had managed to persuade college administrators to end their long-standing tradition of segregation. You know, Lou never viewed himself as any big civil rights activist but as just a mere human being doing the right thing to assist other people.

Now for the really hard part, recruiting-- no Southern University was actively recruiting African-American players for their teams. Although Mississippi during this time period was more or less in racial chaos, Louis chose that state in his first attempt to break the color barrier for his Hardin-Simmons Cowboys. Vehicles bearing out-of-state license plates were immediately viewed with suspicion by the locals. At most stops, he was literally grilled as to the reason he was traveling in Mississippi. Some refused to sell gas to him until his explanation was deemed acceptable.

After meeting with the black junior college coaches, watching practices, and generally getting acquainted with them, some would invite Lou into their homes for dinner. There were no restaurants available where they could eat together. And so, of course, he did. Depending upon how unsettled their towns were, some told Lou it would be much safer for him to just stay with them on their side of town rather than be going in and out. So of course he stayed with them. Several long-term friendships developed between Lou and these courageous coaches. I think he spent approximately two weeks recruiting in Mississippi.

Out of these valiant efforts came two wonderful young men, Nate Madkins and Arthur Haynes of Okolona junior college, who became the first African-American student athletes at Hardin-Simmons. Yes, of course there were a few detractors and just plain racists who sent letters of disgust and threats to everyone actively involved in the integration of Hardin-Simmons. Those letters were filed into the proverbial RAM file and shrugged off as racial ignorance. And life went on.

Traveling on the road with the team was always a little precarious. We ground bagged or went through drive-ins. If we wanted a nice dinner, sometimes our entire group would be provided a room to the side or back of the restaurant out of sight of the regulars. The only hotels that would provide lodging for African-Americans were few and undesirable. If you saw the movie The Green Book-- and by the way, at first when I was typing this I put it down as the Blue Book. And my daughter told me mom it's not the the blue book, that's what you'd look into when you're looking for cars.

It's The Green Book. And Lou and I watched that movie together right here in our home. And Oh my gosh, we relive many, many memories. But that told the story of travel in the South as we experienced it. Because I went with him most of the time to all the games and took our babies with us. If possible, most of the time we drive to a game and back on the same day. Various venues spawned at collective groups of fans as one might imagine.

Overall, I'd say the security at most games was handled well. I don't recall any particular incidents that occurred, just the usual catcalls. However, I'm sure security was somewhat increased home and away. Since Lou was also serving as athletics director, He would have been on top of keeping everyone safe.

On campus, it was school as usual. I truly believe that most Hardin-Simmons students were very welcoming to their new classmates. We lived in a dorm apartment and we were proctors of two connected dormitories, men's dormitories. And we lived right across from our gym. I could walk anywhere on campus in 10 minutes, so I took a full load of classes and was Lou's part-time secretary. We would have been aware if social life on this small campus had gone awry for anyone.

After four success-filled years at Hardin-Simmons, Lou's ama mater called back to campus to rescue a faltering program. We returned to Las Cruces, where he took the Aggies to the Final Four in 1970. Five years later, we would be called to tackle Lou's fourth and possibly most difficult rebuilding project, the basketball program of the Illini Nation.

MARK COOMES: Aunt Mary, that was great and very insightful. Thank you very much.

MARY HENSON: You're welcome

MARK COOMES: Coach Rob Evans, my first encounter with Coach Evans, which he was unaware of, took place in brand new Mackey Arena at Purdue in 1967. I was a freshman in high school. He was guarding the great Rick Mount and doing a great job on him. And the Aggies were heavy underdogs, but they won. Coach Wooden had just run number one UCLA back to his home state and beat Purdue by two in a last second half court shot. I didn't realize at the time, but both of those teams were destined for Final Fours, Purdue in '69, New Mexico State in '70.

Then came the year 1970. I was a freshman in college, and he was my freshman coach and varsity assistant at New Mexico State. He was a very young coach. I knew someday he would be a Division I coach, and he was at Mississippi and at Arizona State. He was a good coach. I really liked him a lot. He was tough and hard-nosed. He was approachable. And I just knew he was going to be very, very successful.

I have this to say about listening to Coach Henson about Rob Evans over the years. When asked about favorite players or favorite teams, Coach would say, you know, I had a lot of good ones. You know, I don't have a real favorite player, but I have a lot of good ones. But Rob, I know for sure that you would be on Coach Henson's Mount Rushmore of favorite players. And the Miracle Midgets, the team that you were first on and co-captained for him, the year before there were four and 22. And you guys came in your first year and went to the NCAA tournament. And beat the defending national champs Texas Western twice, New Mexico once, and got beat by the great Elvin Hayes in Houston 59 AND 58 in the NCAA tournament. Miracle Midgets were one of coach's favorite teams.

Rob you played for Coach and you worked for him. And you were you were a close friend the rest of your life. Tell us about you and Coach over the years and what he meant to you.

ROB EVANS: Thank you very much, Mark, for those kind words. And thanks to the University of Illinois for inviting me to be a part of this great symposium, especially to be able to talk about my coach, my mentor, and especially my friend Coach Lou Henson. I first heard of Coach Henson when I was in junior high school in Hobbs, New Mexico. And he was coaching at Las Cruces high school and having great success there. We were big rivalries and my older brother was only varsity in 1960. And I watched Coach Henson coach when he came to Hobbs, so I knew a little bit about him.

But I really found out more about him as I went to junior college at Lubbock Christian Junior College in Lubbock, Texas. I was fortunate enough to be Lubbock Christian's first All-American. Coach Henson was at Hardin-Simmons at that time as everybody has mentioned. And he came to Lubbock a number of times recruiting me. I found out just how good at recruiting he was and how dogged he was recruiting when about every week I'd look up in the cafeteria. And somebody would say, hey, there's your coach over there. And I'd look around, and there was Coach Henson. And he stayed on me and stayed on me. And I was trying to be nice to him. I wasn't for sure if I was going to go to Hardin-Simmons or not.

But so I thought I could get rid of him by telling him-- I said, Coach, listen. You know, I'm going to school here at Lubbock Christian and the people here kind of want me to go to Abilene Christian. And if I tell them I'm going to go to Hardin-Simmons right now, my grades could fall. So I tell you what Coach, when it you know when I graduate and school is out, then I'll sign with you. And I thought that would get rid of him.

But I finished up school to my sophomore year, my sister was a freshman there. We loaded up the car right after graduation and headed home. And as we got close to my house, I asked my sister-- I said, whose car is at our house? And when I walked in, there sat Coach Henson. And he said, well, school is out. And so I had no choice but to sign with him. And it was a greatest thing, the best thing I ever did. I went to visit the school. And while I was there, we had another recruit in town. And he asked me to recruit that kid for him. And I did recruit him. And we were starting backcourt mates for two years, and Paul Landis.

Mark had mentioned that the first year we were there, we went in there were four and 22 and was the worst team in the history college basketball the year before Coach Henson got there. And I was his first recruit. And he brought in a few other guys, a few other junior college guys and a couple of guys that had been at New Mexico State prior to us getting there but had sat out of school. And he kind of put a mishmash team together. But the thing that resonated with me watching him is just how disciplined he was and how you had to be a certain type player to play for him because he demanded for you to be a teammate. He demanded for you to play hard. He demanded for you to take your details. And I learned all of that as I played for him.

Mark mentioned that we did beat Texas Western twice. They had the same team back that had won a national championship the year before, except for Harry Flournoy. And all of those guys were friends of mine and still are friends of mine now, but we ended up beating them twice. And he was such a great defensive coach until the first year we were there. And we played him the first time at UTEP in El Paso and the second time we played him in Las Cruces. And I think the score at the half was 36 to 11, and they have scored one field goal. And that was in the first half. That was a type of defensive coach that he was and the type of things that he demanded.

So I was fortunate enough to play for him for a couple of years and captain his teams. And then the big thing came when I finished up. My goal was to go back to finish up my degree in English at New Mexico State, and to go back to Hobbs, New Mexico and coach basketball and teach English. Because I had watched my high school coach Ralph Tasker, one of the winningest high school coaches in the history of high school basketball, a guy that's in the Naismith Hall of Fame as a high school-- in the Naismith Hall of Fame right now. I'd watched him, and I saw the impact that he made on young people. Not only on the guys that he coached, but he also taught five classes. And just the kids in his class with the impact that he made, and that was kind of what I wanted to do.

And I watched Coach Henson, and I saw the impact that he had made on a lot of people. So Coach Henson asked me after I graduated in 1968, he said he wanted me to coach the freshman team. And I was excited to do it because I didn't really know what exactly I was going to do at that time. So I was excited to be able to coach a freshman team. And so he gave me that job. And I need to explain to you that in 1968 when he hired me as a coach and back then-- and I was graduate assistant coach that first year, but you did the same thing that all coaches did. You not only recruited, you coached. I coached freshman team. I assisted on the varsity. I was on a road recruiting,

And I remember my first time getting to go recruiting. He said, OK, I want you to go recruiting. I said, where are you going to go? He said you figured that out. And I said, OK. I said, I'll go South. And so Eddie Murphy who was the other assistant coach at that time loved to recruit the east coast, New York and Philadelphia and Jersey. So I was recruiting the South. And so Ed Murphy and I would get in the car in Las Cruces and we would drive to Jackson, Mississippi. And this is in 1968. And of course understand it in 1968, it was a difficult time and a tumultuous time in the history of this country, especially in the South and especially in Mississippi.

And as Mrs. Henson said, if you drove up in a car with a different license tag than Mississippi, people wanted what you were doing down there. They thought you were down there to create some havoc. So Ed Murphy would have the car the New Mexico car that we would grab up and we would go directly to the Jackson Airport. And I would rent a car with a Mississippi license tag on it, so that I could kind of be on under cover, and I could recruit. So and at that time, there was only one hotel that I could stay at in Mississippi in Jackson and that was Edward Lee Motel.

And that was a black-owned hotel and that was where every black person came in there if you would staying, whether you were senior, artist, or basketball coach. Well that's where you stayed. And I will tell you, I was 21-years-old at the time. And I was learning a lot of lessons. Because I would travel during the day and then when it got to be dusk, I got back to that hotel because it was dangerous being a black person and being a black man out after dark in Mississippi at that time. So and Coach Henson would call and check on me quite a bit to make sure that I was OK.

So in 1968 when he hired me, again one of the things that I always like to tell people is that at that particular time there was only one black head basketball coach in the predominantly white schools in America and that was John McLendon. He was at Cleveland State and he had just been a head coach there one year. There were three black assistant coaches in the country. That was George Ravenell was at Maryland, Fred Fox Snowden was at Michigan, and 21-year-old Rob Evans was at New Mexico State. That tells you how Coach Henson-- how his thought process was as far as being inclusive and giving people opportunities.

And then I worked with Coach Henson, as you know, until 1975 when he left to go to the University of Illinois. And I left to go to Texas Tech at that time. When I came out of Lubbock Christian in 1966 as a junior college All-American, as Mrs. Henson said, there were no schools in Texas that were recruiting black athletes. So I had no opportunity to go to Texas Tech. When I went back in 1975, I went back as an assistant coach nine years later, so we had made a little bit of progress.

But Coach Henson always stayed in touch with me and always encouraged me to keep moving forward and keep doing things and keep growing. Even when I was fortunate enough to go back after working with Gerald Myers, who was a great coach of Texas Tech, and then I was with Eddie Sutton, who was at Oklahoma State. I was with him for a couple of years. I always felt like Coach Henson was the absolute best mind in basketball that I've ever seen.

In 1975, we had a team that was just not a real good, not a great team. And a real short team, the biggest guy we had on a team with 6 foot 5 or 6' 6". And we were in the Missouri Valley with Louisville and Drake and Southern Illinois and Memphis and a lot of great teams. And Coach Henson, I remember the mind that he had. He called me doing the middle of the season at home one day. And he said, Rob, we need to change our offense. And I said, Coach, we're in the middle of the season and chatting about changing our offense. And he said, if we're going to win any more games, we've got to change our offense. I didn't know what he was thinking. And so we got together that Sunday and we worked on offense. And we changed our offense. And we ended up finishing second in the league that year and going to play North Carolina in NCAA tournament. I learned real quick how great a mind he was.

I already knew because when we were on the road recruiting, Coach Henson was always a very frugal person as far as spending somebody else's money. He wasn't going to waste money that belonged to New Mexico State University. So we would always rent one room. We had two beds, but we had one room. And we would stay up until 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning. And he would be talking basketball. And I would be ready to go to bed. But he would be talking basketball, would be drawing plays-- he always drew plays while we were in the restaurant or wherever. He's drawing plays on napkins or whatever. And so I would always pick up those napkins. So I said one of these days I'm going to use these plays.

So we stay up to 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning, and then we go to bed by 3:00 o'clock. And then about 5:36 o'clock in the morning, he'd wake up. And he'd shake me and say, Rob, let's go. We've got to get out. And I would say, Coach, we just went to bed a couple hours ago. And he'd say, Rob, that's the problem. That's Why people don't get ahead, they sleep too much. So I learned real quick I had to be up and at them if I'm going to be around Coach Henson.

So I followed his career. And he followed my career, helped me along with my career. The reason that I had the career that I was able to have and even when I went to the University I was able to get a job at the University of Mississippi in 1992, Coach Henson would always call me at least once or twice a week to talk basketball and see how things would going and encourage me. And even when we struggled a little bit at all, he was encouraging me.

In I believe it was 1996, I wanted to honor him. I went back to Illinois because I knew that was his last game at the University of Illinois. They were playing Alabama in the NIT. And Alabama was in our league, and I knew how good they were. And I thought, this could be Coach's last game at Illinois. So I flew back to see him and Mrs. Henson and the family and Coach's last game.

So even after he quit coaching at the University of Illinois, my next year at Ole Miss. He and Mrs. Henson flew to Memphis to spend time with my wife Carolyn and I at the SEC tournament. And I never, never have forgotten that. That they came and spent time.

I think the thing that I like to say is that Coach did a lot for me but he did a lot for a lot of people, especially in the world of integrating situations at New Mexico State University. We had some kids that come in and they were not quite up to snuff as far as college curriculum. And Coach created some classes, had the university create some classes to get those guys up to snuff so that they could graduate. And most of the kids graduated that was on with Coach Henson because he demanded that we were in class and that we were there for a reason. We were there to graduate. And so I took that along with me when I began my head coaching career.

But even after Coach began to get somewhat ill, I would always hear from him. I would call him. He would call me. And even sometimes Mrs. Henson would call me. And she'd say, Rob, Lou wanted to talk to you. And so we spent time talking. We talked basketball. If he was in the area where I am in Texas, if he would just let me know, we would all go with-- my wife and I would always meet Mrs. Henson.

And Mrs. Henson was as much a part of the basketball program. She was in practice a lot, and she would encourage us as much as anybody. And I've always had a great love for her and Lou and Lisa and Lori and Leann, as Jimmy said.

So my story is this. Coach Henson was the reason that I was able to have the success that I had and the career that I've had. And I'm forever grateful to him and his family for that.

MARK COOMES: Rob, that was fantastic. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. That was fantastic.

MARY HENSON: Thank you, Rob

MARK COOMES: We're moving on to Ed Hightower. Ed, your career and life collided in 1982. I was the head coach of Wabash Valley Community college in Mount Carmel, Illinois I was 30 years old, and you were younger than me. And you were a referee breaking in the profession. We started the season, and you had one of our games in November. I told my AD Paul Schnarre after the game, we need to get this guy as much as possible. I really, really like him. Over the next couple of years, I got you less. The four-year schools were gobbling you up.

When I went back to Illinois in 1985, there you were, spiraling upward in your illustrious career, Ed, in the Big Ten and the Big East, which did not surprise me at all. And I want to tell you this privately, Ed, that coaches do talk about referees. And Lou and I spent time together in the locker room before the game finalizing their plans, and we always talked about the referees. Lou always felt good when you were on the games, especially on the road, Ed, and especially when we were at Indiana, Purdue, or Iowa. Because we knew, Ed, that you would give us a fair game, that you would not let those hostile crowds intimidate you, and you would not let the big bad coaches intimidate you.

We've been friends for a long time, Ed. Please give us the inside story of how your relationship with Coach, how it developed, and how he affected your career.

ED HIGHTOWER: Thank you, Mark. First of all, I want to say thank you to Mrs. Henson for those outstanding comments. Wow, that was a history lesson in itself. And coach, I've known you for a long, long time, Rob, and watched you coach, your career. You were always tough, but you were always fair. And I want to thank you for the tremendous work that you have done over the years with young people.

But as we're talking about Coach Henson, we know what a great coach he was. But I believe his achievements as a compassionate humanitarian was even more evident. He was he was ahead of his time, folks. There's so much time in our country today being spent on trying to define social justice. If you just go back to the simple philosophy that Coach Henson had, it was all about opening doors of access and opportunity for others. Open the door, it's just being fair: equity, fairness, treating people like you want to be treated.

Now, I didn't know all of the wonderful stories that Rob told as well as Mrs. Henson about Coach, but I've got a story that will somewhat validate the comments that have been made so far. Because Rob and certainly Mrs. Henson, Mark, they were close. They were on the inner circle. But when you're talking about doors of access, let me tell you a story about how I came to know Coach Henson.

I was fortunate to join the Big Ten Conference as a referee at age 29 and enjoy 36 years as an NCAA basketball official, including 12 final fours, the 1990 World Championship of Basketball in South America, 1994 Goodwill Games in St. Petersburg, Russia, while Coach Henson had a major role in my career. In 1977, I was assigned to referee a game where Coach Henson was in attendance watching a potential basketball recruit. Now, keep in mind what I'm saying. Social justice opened the door of access to Ed Hightower, and I didn't even know it at the time. We had not met, nor did we speak after the game. After years past, I learned that Coach Henson had submitted my name to the Big Ten Conference supervisor of officials.

Coach Henson understood that every major conference out there was in need of quality referees and particularly African-Americans. There weren't very many good-- well, first of all, there weren't very many African-American officials back then. As I came to know Coach Henson, I learned my experience with him was not the exception but rather the rule for how he viewed his responsibliity to others. As we talk about access, access, fairness, equity, doing to others what you would want done to your self, Coach Henson was a quiet, professional, respected, and influential voice among his peers. He believed the game was designed for the players and demanded that those responsible for his execution perform at peak level.

Now, I'd worked a lot of games for Coach Henson. I worked probably more games for Coach Knight than any official in the Big Ten. I worked more games for Judd Heathcoate at that period of time than any official in the Big Ten. Gene Keady, you just go right down the line. And I would catch these guys on the road a lot, Mark, as you know. There would be no nonsense. I listen. I listen well. But then after listening, it was somewhat like a judge. You make the rule and you make the decision, but fair-- fairness, giving everybody an opportunity to do their job.

As I stated, he made it a priority even before this was popular our demand placed upon coaches to attend the NCAA basketball rules interpretation meetings prior to mandatory attendance. You would see Coach Henson at meetings. It was amazing. We'd look around, there was Henson. He was there. He spearheaded changes regarding the recruitment and training of referees, leading in a positive campaign for the implementation of a formative and summative evaluation instrument for assessing the performance of referees. Not that he was trying to fire referees. But he demanded that they know the rules, be able to adjudicate those rules, be in good shape, fairness. He advocated for increased wages and benefits, which he believed provided the Big Ten Conference with a competitive advantage over other major conferences competing for the top tier referees.

The Big Ten Conference was the highest paid conference. They set the benchmark for other conferences. They set the benchmark for going out hiring African-American officials. Coach Henson encouraged coaches and referees to connect professionally in order to better understand each other. He advocated for such positive changes in the refereeing industry, it forced other prominent coaches in other conferences to make similar modifications.

Now again, he did not go around with a badge or a sign on his chest saying, I did this. I did not find out until five years later that it was Coach Henson who wrote the letter that got me into the Big Ten. And by the way, Coach Henson never told me that he had written this letter. But he was a person that believed that it was not only his job to coach but it was equally his job to open doors and also to provide access for other people.

Let me just sum it up. As an Illinois educator of 41 years, including as superintendent of schools, serving on the Southern Illinois Board of Trustees as the vice chair, I've traveled across the state speak to thousands of people regarding education and sports. Whenever Lou Henson's name is mentioned, there's always that thread. He sincerely cares about people. He sincerely cared about people. And I think that's what everybody is saying today.

So again, thank you for allowing me to be part of this symposium tonight and to express my sincere gratitude for Coach Henson providing that access to Ed Hightower for Ed Hightower, and never, never holding it over my head or asking me for anything in return. That speaks volumes about the man.

MARK COOMES: That was tremendous, Ed. Thank you very, very much, Ed. Dr. Jim Phillips-- Jim and my paths crossed in 1985. Bob Hall left, and Coach offered me the job. And I took it. Bob left me a folder of information, and I talk to him several times on the phone. He always ended our conversation by saying, if you have any questions, ask Jim Phillips. I wondered who this Phillips kids was that seemed to be the shell answer man to the operations of the Illinois basketball program. I was not disappointed. Jim was outstanding, organized, enthusiastic, sincere, and really a hard worker

I'll give you an example. We would come back from road games at one or two in the morning. I would say to him, I'm coming back between 6 and 7 to watch tape. I need our next three opponents and all the tapes in chronological order, please, on the table. There was never a misstep. This work ethic and attention to detail are two of the reasons he is recognized by his peers as one of the top athletic directors in the country. Jim, Coach always talked and dreamed about you coming back home and being the director of athletics at your alma mater, but circumstances and timing were never right.

Also, in two years, Jim will be on TV as the chairman of the Division I basketball selection committee. And we and Dick Vitale can ask him how come he put this team here and this team here. So we're looking forward to two years from now, Jim, to have Dick grill you. Please, Jim, tell us of your and Coach's relationship over the years and what it meant to you, what he meant to you, and how he assisted you.

JAMES PHILLIPS: Thank you, Mark. And first I just want to say what a classy individual Rob Evans and Ed Hightower are. I've admired both of you from afar. We've had a chance to interact and be in the same circles in our careers. I know how much Coach thought of the two of you and how much he cared about the two of you. Your words were brilliant.

Tonight, I'm going to say some things, and it's under the heading: Coach, thanks for changing my life. I grew up in Chicago one of 10 children, the youngest of 10, six older sisters and three older brothers. I'm a first generation four-year college student. And I traveled and found my way to the University of Illinois, a chance to go study at a premier institution. And thankfully, before I got there, I had a high school coach at Weber Catholic High School in Chicago that made an introduction to Coach Henson and said, I have somebody you may want to take a look at that maybe could help your basketball program. He's willing to do anything. And those were values that I was taught at an early age.

So I travelled down to Champaign. And I started a love affair with a family and a coach that I didn't really know at all. And I want to just maybe relay it through ten characteristics. I know we have students watching as part of a class and curriculum for Professor Raycraft, and I want to just take 10 words and tell you a little bit about how I learned some of these things or saw some of these things in Coach.

Pioneer, you heard the stories. You heard about desegregation back in 1962. That was Coach Henson. It was always about the person and the individual, never about the skin color. It was never about anything other than trying to provide an opportunity for other people. He was a champion for others. And he taught me how to be a champion for others. It's the career that I've enjoyed over the last 25 plus years. I saw it firsthand. I saw how you could have a love affair with education, which was really important to Coach, and sport, the sport of basketball. It was as powerful of a connection of two things that I loved in my life that I could ever imagine, and he showed me the path of how to do that.

He was also the one to say to get out of coaching. You're too smart for that, Jimmy. You need to go into administration. I used to laugh with him about that because I thought and I always believed he was smart. And he was somebody that I wanted to be. He was a mentor, friend, and coach, just like Rob Evans said.

He was a family man. That's what I loved in my life. I loved my parents, I loved my siblings, I love the relationship we had. I saw that with Mary and Coach and Lori and Lisa and Leann and Lou Junior and Mark and extended family members. He demonstrated that each day of my life and of his life as I was down there.

He was a man of faith, a God-fearing individual. Faith was important to him. And that belief continued to build upon what I was taught at home. But when you leave home, you're not sure where you're going to go. And I'm really talking to the students right now. You're trying to find your way. You're trying to make sense of your first 18 years of your life and the things that you've learned and been taught. And then how does that transition into when I leave? And what am I going to be about? What's going to be important to me? He's a man of faith and being a man of faith, It was so clear to all of us that knew him.

He was caring. And that's been said both by Ed and by Coach Evans. He cared more about other people than he did about himself.

He was generous. He was generous with his time. He was generous with his talents. And he was generous with his money. Whenever he could provide something for somebody, he always gave back to the local community, to the local non-profit, to the church. Wherever and whatever he could do, he always tried to give back to somebody else.

He was a fighter. He was a fighter that fought cancer multiple times, who would not let chemotherapy get him down. It didn't matter how many times he had to travel to MD Anderson in Houston. He taught me that. He taught me that never give up mentality all the way until his last breath.

He was competitive. And I always felt like I was competitive and still am. And he'd smile at you and love you up and give you a hug. And he would want to crush you in anything that you played, cards-- bridge especially, on the basketball court. He was competitive.

He was kind. He was humble. I wish we had a little bit more of that, and compassionate. He changed my life. I want to read a paragraph that I was honored to send to the Naismith Hall of Fame. And I want to play a voicemail for you that's about 30 seconds long, but it's really near and dear to my heart. First, the paragraph about how I felt about him, especially at this time in our country as we see the divisiveness, as we see the injustices socially.

The headlines touting Coach Henson's winning ways unduly overshadowed a humble personality and more importantly, a pioneering commitment to racial equality in the game of basketball. As we all work today together to be active participants in the fight against racism and systemic injustice, we acknowledge and really revere and honor the steps coach Henson made to desegregate the game and his communities nearly six decades ago.

As we heard, in 1962 Coach Henson initially refused the head coaching job at Hardin-Simmons until school leaders promised and permitted him to integrate the team. As you heard, two black student athletes for the first time and hired a LatinX assistant coach on the staff for the first time. Nothing more needs to be said. He was way ahead of everybody. And I'm glad we're able to finally talk about some of the things that have been so overshadowed by all the wins and all the championships and all those basketball accolades.

The last thing is-- it'll be quick. I want to play a voicemail message for you that I received on June 21, 2020. June 21st is Father's Day. . It has a special place in all the hearts of every father that we know and those of us that are fathers. I'm blessed to be the father of five kids. And they're everything to me. And I have a message from Coach Henson that I want to play.

LOUIS HENSON (VOICEMAIL): Jim, Lou Henson calling. I want to wish you a happy Father's Day. Leigh's here with me, and she wants to do the same thing. And so we'll chat with you later.

LEIGH HENSON (VOICEMAIL): Yes, you are one of the first people that dad wanted to call today. I'm helping him call some special people. So we want to wish you a happy Father's Day.

LOUIS HENSON (VOICEMAIL): Love you.

LEIGH HENSON (VOICEMAIL): Bye.

JAMES PHILLIPS: His last words to me were love you. Well Coach, I love you. Thank you for changing my life.

MARK COOMES: Thank you, Jim, tremendous. The next segment is our Illinois segment, 1975. The segment is a little bit different because from 1975 to 1996, we all grew up. Hardin-Simmons, we were all young. New Mexico State, Rob was pretty young, he was playing for him. But from '75 to '96, Rob was at Texas Tech, Oklahoma State, and the head coach at Mississippi. Ed Hightower was in the middle of an illustrious Big Ten and Big East refereeing, right in the middle of the best games in the country.

Mary, Jim, and I were in Illinois together. So we want to know exactly what 1975 was, the most difficult by far of any of the previous jobs. In 1975, Coach and Mary had a chance to choose at the same time to go to the University of Oklahoma, his state, or the University of Illinois, her state. Why is always the question they chose Illinois?

Part of the decision was Mary's family. She had nine siblings, most in Illinois. But the other part was Coach's appetite for competition. Rob, if you've ever watched and played dominos gin rummy, checkers, 500, bridge, recruiting, scouting, game planning, or games themselves, he loves competition. And he really loves figuring out how to win.

The Big Ten Conference at that time was the best conference by far in the country. Unfortunately for Coach and Mary and me, Illinois had major issues when he took over the helm. Number one, they were not far removed from the devastating slush fund. The club was still hanging over the school.

Number two, they had back to back last place teams in the Big Ten standings. And he was the third coach in three years. That was historical low for the University of Illinois basketball program. The Illinois Basketball Coaches Association at that time wanted one of their high school coaches to be the head coach of Illinois and the last two guys were turned down. When Gene Bartow got the job and then Luke Henson got the job, they weren't happy. The coaches in Chicago were unhappy because when they came down to the state tournament, they did not feel like they got treated fairly on and off the court in Champaign-Urbana.

The facilities were lacking. We did not have a basketball practice arena. We practiced all fall in dilapidated Huff Hall. We'd never had closed practices. And if you wanted to try to get Assembly Hall in the fall, it was easier to get into Fort Knox. It was that hard to get into the Hall. We didn't own it, somebody else did. The AD was very frugal to say the least. IIllinois was the only school in the conference that had two full-time positions. Coach brought me in after being a grad assistant to him. And he brought me m and he wanted me to be the third assistant.

He was making $30,000 without a shoe contract, without a TV program, or without a television program. So each of the coaches-- he was making $30,000. But each of the coaches had to give up a little bit of their salary, Tony Yates and Les Woethke, so that I could make $3,000 that year as a full-time assistant. The next year, I got the same salary or had been offered the same salary, so I had to go find a job. I had a wife and child.

There was no student group. There was no Orange Krush Isn't that right, Peter Korst and Alan Solow, who helped Coach form that group? There was no adult group. There was no Rebounders. Isn't that right Jim Wright, Dick Lord, and Arth Holeman, early Rebounders that helped him get that program going. And to make matters worse, Luke Olson was to the West getting Illinois players like Ronnie Lester, Kenny Arnold, Kevin Crases and Kevin Boyle. And to the East, Bob Knight was getting Quinn Buckner, Isaiah Thomas, Glen Gruenwald, Marcus Simmons, et cetera, et cetera, and winning national championships from the state of Illinois.

The first year we were there, we were very competitive. We beat a really good Arizona team and New Mexico team. We beat Purdue and ended their 13-game winning streak against Illinois. And we beat the University of Michigan that got second in the country with the great Rickey Green and Phil Hubbard. By year four, with Mark Smith and Eddie Johnson as the sophomore forwards, they upset eventual national champion Michigan State with Magic Johnson and were off to the races. Illinois won more Big Ten games than any other team in the decade of the 80s. When I came back as an assistant in 1985, I actually thought I was on another planet compared to when we came in 1975.

It must also be pointed out the coach had six athletic directors or interims during that 21 period of time. That must be an NCAA record, the common denominator regardless of assistant coaches, players, or 80s was Coach Henson's expertise in his recruiting, coaching, and his great public relations-- or, as he would say, his PR.

Aunt Mary, I'm going to ask you first. But this is an open panel discussion about this 21 period for Coach and Mary and everybody that participated in the Illinois program. So Aunt Mary, tell us a little bit about what you faced. And I want everybody to be involved because everybody had different perspectives, and we were all grown up then. Aunt Mary.

MARY HENSON: Yes. OK, I have a headline here. I don't know if anybody can see it though. Can you all read this headline? It says, "Devaux to be named by Illini." I went into my scrapbook today and pulled all this stuff out. And that's what it said, "Devaux to be name by Illini." And that was one of the headlines we were met with when we came here. But here's I don't even know who Gary Stein is. I'm sorry Gary. But this is his article. And it tells it like it is.

"Attention, saviors. Illinois needs you." This was in 1975. He says, "I'm starting to get the impression there is only one man who could save the University of Illinois athletic program, and he died almost 2000 years ago. It just seems that the things that have been happening at Illinois in the past decade are beyond belief and you have to wonder if a mere mortal can turn things around. When basketball Coach Jane Bartell left Illinois Wednesday to take the UCLA job, it was only the latest in a long list of setbacks that makes you believe that Champaign rivals the [INAUDIBLE] as the most godforsaken place on Earth.

Almost 10 years ago, it was the slush fund scandal. Then the winless football years under Jim Valek. Then the firing, rehiring, and firing again of Valek. Then the firing, rehiring, and firing again of Valek during midseason. Then the problems with Harv Schmidt and the unbelievable amount of ineligibility and injury problems that have sidelined top Illinois athletes. In the past 10 years, the arrival of Bartow was perhaps the only bright light on the Illinois scene. With his exit, the basketball program and recruiting in particular is in shambles. Bartow's successor will have to start over at the bottom again. If there are any unemployed saviors out there, the job opportunities are great in Champaign."

Now, didn't that tell the whole story right there?

MARK COOMES: So Coach Evans, you were at Mississippi--

MARY HENSON: Wait minute. Wait a minute. I've got another headline, can you see it? "Henson Named Illini Coach," and I don't know if you remember it, if you can even see m but he's got that big plaid suit on. Plaid was big back then. He's got this plaid suit on, and they showed it. But the headline I was looking for and I cannot find it is "Lou, Who?" And the ones of you around here, you probably remember that headline. And I think it was in the News Gazette when he was hired. Lou, who? And that's how we started out at this program.

Of course, he was a very unpopular choice. We know that. Most people didn't have a clue who Lou was. I don't know why they hadn't been following the Final Fours because they would have known his name then. But anyway, the bottom line is we started in the hole big time. That's all I have to say about that

MARK COOMES: Coach Evans, you were at Mississippi in '92, but you were at Oklahoma State and Texas Tech. How did you view Illinois during those 21 years? What did you think?

ROB EVANS: Well I viewed it like everybody else did. I thought of was one of the worst jobs in the country outside of the University of Mississippi, which was just bad I do remember Eddie Sutton telling me when I took a job in Mississippi that you could take Mr. Iba, you could take Jon Wooden, and you could take Adolph Rupp, and you couldn't win in Mississippi. And I kind of felt the same way at the University of Illinois.

But once Coach Henson took the job, I knew that it wasn't going to be long because of his work ethic. He was going to hire the right people. He was going to put the right people around him. He was going to do it the right way. And he was going to outwork people. And that's what he always did. So that's why it got turned around like it did

MARK COOMES: Yeah Ed, you watched the program grow. You started in the early 80s. Tell us about what you thought.

ED HIGHTOWER: Oh, certainly. I was a fan back then just starting out. And the only support that you could give Illinois was it was in close proximity to us down here. But we looked at programs, you certainly didn't look at Illinois as a program that you could be proud of or even support back then. But as Coach Henson got involved, it just without question-- from a public relations point of view, Coach Henson would be down in our area. I don't know if you remember the name Doc Shoemaster down here. Remember that name, Mrs. Henson?

MARY HENSON: I do.

ED HIGHTOWER: Oh, yes Oh, yes He was. And my mentor, Bob Metzger, Bob Manchester, who was the vice president of the glass company at that time and a big supporter of Illinois, those two guys would just say to everyone down in this area. you've got to stay with Illinois. We're going to turn this thing around. We're going to turn this thing around. And they would be marketing and telling the story about Lou Henson.

Give this guy an opportunity to get it done. And Lou got it done. And he did it the right way with hard work, commitment, telling the story, telling the story and having people buy in because everybody wants to be part of a successful act. Everybody wants to be part. And you look at what has happened with the Illinois program over the years and the success that [INAUDIBLE].

I worked seven consecutive Final Fours, starting with the '88 national championship with Oklahoma and Kansas. And then the following year, Illinois, in '89, you were in Seattle for the Final Four. I did not work Illinois' game, but I was there. And certainly with a couple situations that could have been different, Illinois could have been right there in that championship ballgame. But Lou Henson did a marvelous job of building the Illinois program to what it is today.

MARK COOMES: So Jim, you were with us at the right time. I mean from '85 to '90, we were on top of the world. I mean, we were getting all the best players in the state. And that was our goal. We started in '75 with Les and Tony. We wanted to give Illinois players. We wanted to build a program with Illinois players. Whether you go to Proviso West, whether you go to Pekin, whether you go to Chicago, whether you go to Pontiac, all the Illinois fans watched the best Illinois players during those times. And we wanted to get them, and we got them. But you were with us during that time. '85, Jim, tell us about it.

JAMES PHILLIPS: Well, this is the side that I think we all loved about Coach. Because you're right Mark. The time that I was blessed to be at Illinois-- five straight top five seeds in the NCAA tournament, a trip to the Final Four, sweet 16. He would come into that back room of the Assembly Hall, where I lived, and Don Maurer lived, and Roger Lowe, and Jon Giannini, the graduate assistants, you were back there. We had about six people in a room that was about 10 by 10.

And every once in a while, just to kind of rile us up, he'd walk in there and say, you guys are all front-runners. None of you have any idea what it took for us to get to this program. You guys just show up and all of a sudden we're a top 20 program. And he'd walk out. And we didn't know if he was serious, or if he was just kidding. We all knew he was just kidding, but he would mess with us like that. So that's just how it was, and that's the beauty of Coach because he never took himself too seriously. And he always like to have some fun. He wanted to win badly.

But the fruits of his labor, if you will, were those days that you described, that Ed described, that Coach Evans described. That, you started to see all that time and energy from taking a bottom-feeder, one of the worst programs in college basketball to the pinnacle. And that was Lou Henson. He had his fingerprints over all of that success.

ED HIGHTOWER: Mark, can I also add something if you don't mind.

MARK COOMES: Sure.

ED HIGHTOWER: You know, I just think about this, I talked about Lou Henson advocated for referees. Lou Henson, he was a difference maker. OK? He was not a loud person, but he got things done. Again, he didn't talk to me as I was a young kid, and I never knew until five years later that he had recommended that I get into the Big Ten. Well, during the summer time, he would call. And his goal was to try to make the Big Ten holistic, meaning good athletes, good coaches, good officials, good working conditions.

And so we started the association in the Big Ten for officials. We were not a union. You are an independent contractor. But the way it came about was getting officials better working conditions, more money. He called me, and he said, Ed, you've risen in the Big Ten. And you work a lot of other conferences now. I was working. Back then, I was a young official but I was one of a few along with Jim Boomer Bain that was working multiple conferences because I would lease an airplane. And I could go. And I was an African-American. And so as long as I dedicated to Big Ten as my number one conference, they would allow me to work in the Big Eight at that time. And I would move around.

Lou Henson was smart and was fair. He did not want the better officials to be working as their priority conference with someone else. So he asked me, tell me how we can make things better for our officials. So we talked about paying more, making the officials more of a priority than they were back then. And he says, well, how about our dressing facilities. Now, Illinois had one of the worst dressing facilities in the league back then. We were upstairs. So I said, Coach. He said, how do we rate what the other facilities? I said, Coach, I don't know if you want to hear this now but Illinois has one of the worst facilities. We do? I'll tell you what. You'd notice now and back then, our facilities changed at Illinois. And it was Lou Henson who got all of that done, folks.

So he was an advocator for the conference. He was a voice for the conference. But not one of these people who is a rabble rouser that created problems, made demands. I never heard him use profanity on the sideline. Would he stomp and rage? Would he get after you? Yes, he would. But he got things done. And I think that is a legacy that we need to keep in mind. How did we get to the point of recognizing officials for being a part of the game? Lou Henson was one of the people who made that happen, folks.

MARY HENSON: Thank you, Ed.

MARK COOMES: Yes, Coach Evans.

ROB EVANS: Mark, let me piggyback on that a little bit. Because I can remember, as you remember, when I was a Mexico State of the young coach and player, we played at Las Cruces high school where Coach Henson coached. In high school, that was our home court. And I can remember him when I started coaching with him. He called telling me one day, he said, you know, Rob, I got to get a new arena. And he went to work and got the state and everybody else to get a new arena. And he told me at that time, he said if we don't get this done right now, in another 10 years it's going to cost so much money you'll never get it done. And I look back on that now. And I'm like, man, what wisdom did he have.

The other thing that he told me in 1970, my second year of coaching with him, he gave me a set of clubs. And he told me, he said you need to learn to play golf. He said coach, there's a lot of deals made on a golf course. And he came with that set of golf clubs, and I learned to play golf. And I can tell you, I have made a lot of deals-- alumni and boosters and things like that. When I was at Arizona State, I was able to raise over a billion for a new locker room just playing golf with a guy that I didn't even know he had money. And all of a sudden, he ends up donating over $1 million for to do that. So I look back on him, and I thought, man, how wise was this guy.

ED HIGHTOWER: Oh, no question.

MARK COOMES: Well, guys, we're going to have to wrap up the evening. I'm sorry. We're going on two hours pretty soon. So these are the final thoughts from each of our panelists. What a great night for everybody, and thank you. Coach Evans, can we have your final thoughts, please?

MARK COOMES: Well, Mark, I think the final thoughts that I have is I'm just again so appreciative of the opportunity to get a chance to talk about somebody that I admired for a long time, and somebody that made my life and my family's life so much better. As was said, he was so selfless. He thought about other people more so than he thought about himself. And he certainly thought about Rob Evans a whole lot more than he thought about Lou Henson.

MARK COOMES: Ed, please, your final thoughts.

ED HIGHTOWER: I would say that Lou Henson and connected and changed the lives of thousands of young people, many of whom were from disadvantaged families and crushing circumstances. But through their association, through my association with Coach Henson, they, I were able to pick themselves, myself up and rise above our circumstances to transform our lives, their lives, and those around them to be better people.

MARK COOMES: Thank you very much, Ed. Jim, your final thoughts.

JAMES PHILLIPS: My final thoughts, and I didn't get a chance to say enough. But you couldn't talk about Coach without Mary. And they showed us all how to live faithfully with each other, to be committed to others, to be committed to their family, to be selfless, and to pave the way as both Rob and Ed have said for others. And so, I think it was so well said by Ed here, they changed the lives of thousands of individuals. And they've left a legacy. And Coach's success has Mary right with it. So she just was as important to this whole entire life that Coach had as anyone. So God bless Coach, and God bless Mary and the Henson family.

MARK COOMES: Thank you, Jim.

MARY HENSON: Thank you, Jim.

MARK COOMES: Aunt Mary, final thoughts, please.

MARY HENSON: Yes, I have thoughts. First, I want to tell all these family members how proud that Lou and I were or are of you Jimmy. Ed, we're so thrilled that you became such a fabulous, fabulous referee-- I mean, and also an educator. You know Coach got his-- how much time do I have?

MARK COOMES: Aunt Mary, you have two and a half minutes.

MARY HENSON: OK. Lou got his master's degree in education, and he had to make the decision when he was getting his masters whether he was going to be a superintendent of schools or coach.

ED HIGHTOWER: Wow.

MARY HENSON: He had to make that decision. And then they offered him the job at Las Cruise's high school, the math job and the assistant job. So he went with the coaching. And that's how that came about. We are so proud of all of you who have been like sons. When we lost our son Lou Junior, it was devastating of course. But one of our players, and I wish I could remember who, came up to me and said, you've lost one son, Mrs. Henson. But you will always have many sons. And that is exactly the way Coach and I felt, that all of you are sons of ours. And we want the very best for you.

And Ed, I wanted to tell you. And I think I might have told you this-- that Lou was a college referee. And I don't know how many people know that, but he really was. He refereed while he was in high school, coaching in high school. He refereed at the Border Conference, and he refereed in the end the Western-- not the Western Athletic conference, see, the one that Silver City-- New Mexico, Western was in-- the Frontier Conference. The Frontier conference, it used to be a Frontier Conference. But he refereed in both of those.

He refereed for Don Haskins at UTEMP. He refereed Arizona, Arizona State. He refereed all those, but he got so busy he just couldn't keep up with everything. So he had to give up his college refereeing, even though he was excellent. He was an excellent. He might have been as good as Ed. I don't know, Ed. But anyway--

ED HIGHTOWER: Probably would have been better. Probably would have been better.

MARY HENSON: But he was good. that I just want to tell you how much I appreciate the kind words. We all miss Coach too. Oh, well you know, we all miss him. But please keep in touch with me, will you? Because I really do love all of you. Just keep in touch, OK? And Mark, I know I'll see you. You'll be in one of my bedrooms one of these days soon.

MARK COOMES: Thank you, Aunt Mary. Thank you, Aunt Mary. My final thoughts, as I think about Coach Henson's great career and all the positive aspects of his life we've discussed, I want to reflect briefly on his life after retirement in 2005. I remember when Tim Robbins, the character Andy told Morgan Freeman, the character Red in the movie Shawshank Redemption, the choice is you get busy living, or you get busy dying. Lou chose to live and took on lymphoma, viral encephalitis, and leukemia with a passion to beat and conquer those dreaded diseases. In baseball venacular,

As our good friend Hall of Fame Itchy Jones once said to me, Lou is the ultimate grinder. Believe me, my friends, that is the ultimate compliment. He was a great example for all of us in staying focused and staying positive with all the pain and suffering he endured. Through all the medical issues he faced, we also had great days together. Kathy and I moved down to Champaign, I was with him a lot the last 10 years.

I witnessed him giving his time with conversation, photographs, or autographs. Going to visitations, funerals, hospitals, or nursing homes to see people he didn't know because of a phone call or a favor was standard operating procedure for Louis and Mary. His presence lit up the bowling alley, the bridge center, the Esquire, or Assembly Hall whenever he was there. He was truly a man of the people.

This has been a great night talking and reminiscing about Coach. Again, I want to thank Mike Raycraft. You were fantastic when you called me, Mike, and you gave this idea to me. You have been on point the last four weeks tremendously.

And to pay this tribute to Coach Henson, I want to thank the panel, their insights about Lou and his influence on their lives and careers. Aunt Mary has been spectacular as usual. And we all thank her for being herself over the years. We all love her very much. There would be no Lou Henson as we all know him without Mary Henson.

The basketball has stopped bouncing for Uncle Lou. When you combine his three state championships at Las Cruces High with his 42 years of extraordinary college coaching and his willingness to help and support individuals and treat people with total respect, he unquestionably led a Hall of Fame life. The great era of Coach Lou Henson in college basketball has come to an end with his passing. But it will never ever be forgotten. Thank you, and goodnight.

MARY HENSON: Thank you, Mark.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: Thank you, Mark.

MARK COOMES: Thank you guys.

MIKE RAYCRAFT: On behalf of our students and faculty of the Department of Recreation, Sport and Tourism, I want to thank you all for the valuable insight of this legendary campus and basketball icon. Coach Henson's lasting legacy will inspire us all to be socially-informed and active members of our community. Equity and inclusion are foundational values of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and the College of Applied Health Sciences.

It is a privilege to support and advance these ideals and contribute to society's healing. To my students, I look forward to seeing you next week with our discussion with Tatiana McFadden and the session on designing facilities for inclusion.

Again, I'd like to thank our incredible panelists for their time this evening. It's been an amazing session. Thank you for joining us, and go Illini.

MARY HENSON: And everyone, stay safe. Please stay healthy and safe.

CARLA SANTOS: Thank you again so much. We are so thankful that you are willing to give us this much of your time. We really do want to thank you, sincerely.

MARY HENSON: Thank you, Carla.